 Coming up on the breakfast today, PDP members of the House of Representatives walk out on the plenary session over the ban on Twitter. The lawmaker accuses a speaker of disallowing them from debating the issue. More than 200 people protest over old salaries and delayed employment international assembly workforce. And the review of today's papers in Off the Press plus so much more coming up this morning on the breakfast. Good morning to you and welcome to the breakfast here on Plus TV Africa. Thank you for joining us and starting off this Wednesday morning with us. The weather is a little calm this morning. Yesterday we were shocked, you know, the way change but hopefully it's going to be clear and smooth all day today. Good morning, Aneta. Good morning to you and good morning to you. Thank you for joining us on the breakfast this morning. A pretty interesting turn of events regarding the Twitter ban. We know about what happened yesterday when the PDP members actually walked out saying they feel like the voices were not being heard, you know, and they decided to defy the ban by saying they were going to Twitter. You know, in essence challenging the government to arrest them, you know. We also know about the Twitter ban with Attorney General of the Federation, Abu Bakr Malami and how Nigerians quickly, you know, discovered, you know, put on their FBI gloves and put their hands behind their backs and said, oh, we can smell a rat. And they found out that, you know, VPNs were being used to tweet and that they found a cryptocurrency ban, so a cryptocurrency app. So it's just a lot of a mixed bag for me. And I wouldn't want to use the word hypocrisy, even though that's what it is. But I don't know, maybe he's trying to do some surveillance work. I have no idea whatever excuse he might have for that. You know, that's what it is. Well, it was a little dramatic. There's people who have also criticized, you know, other PDP lawmakers who didn't, you know, join the walk out. There's those who have also said, you know, that, you know, even if the PDP lawmakers didn't agree with Femi Bajabiamila, you know, he was disrespectful to walk out of the house. And then there's those who say also that Femi Bajabiamila was, of course, playing politics with the whole issue and should have let them have their say with regards to the Twitter ban. Even if he had already stated that the midst of information was going to be or has been invited and should join, you know, the housework discussion, you know, within 10 days and all of that. But, you know, all that drama really, you know, I believe is expected, you know, because as an opposition member, you should be able to somehow some way speak for the people. Actually, it shouldn't even be because you're an opposition member. I think it's a simple, very, very simple thing. As long as you are in the House of Representatives, you represent the millions and millions of Nigerians across the country. So you don't have to be a member of the opposition party first before you, you know, listen to what your people are saying, before you listen to what the people across the country, regardless of what state they're from. It's like a ship in a wolf's hole. Yeah, so shameful, you know, that's the type of policy that we play in Nigeria where the voices of the people and the demands of the people and the lives of the people are, you know, less important than your political party and, you know, what your alliances are. That's the shameful part of it. But it really shouldn't be a PDP versus APC discussion here. It should be a House of Representatives. So what hope do we have that if eventually the... What hope do we have in the National Assembly to ever speak on behalf of the people if they're always going to lean towards whatever political parties that they, you know, belong to? So when then do the voices of the people, and the reason that they're there in the first place, because you're there to represent the people, you're not there to represent your political party. So why, you know, and what hope do Nigerians have ever that the National Assembly will come together and say, this is what the voices of the people are saying. We do not agree with this policy or that policy. And that's why when people say it's a Robustan Assembly, you can't really argue why do we have a conversation about PDP lawmakers walking out and then the rest of them staying back. And of course, some PDP lawmakers are also staying back. So what side are you really on? Are you on the side of the people who voted and put you in that position, or are you on the side of the political party through which you got into that position? So do you think all PDP members should have spoken with a voice? Now, you know, when we talk about opposition parties, you know, some analysts will tell you that we don't actually have a stronger position in the country. You know, the only issue, press statements, we're not actually doing much. We're considering that all PDP members should have had one voice regarding this issue to say, a Twitter ban is illegal, is unconstitutional, and if we're all walking out to make a statement, let's do that in unison rather than some say back. So what I'm saying is that it shouldn't be just PDP members. It should be persons in the House of Representatives, all of them, more than 300, who should be able to... But you know, that's what... See, I totally understand you, that's what it should be. I mean, that's why you're elected, that's why you're there. But when you look at where politics is played in Nigeria, they would suspend you and say that you're accused of anti-party activities. I mean, we know how this happened. Even though we know what the idea should be, but we know what it is, what the reality is about. Yeah, but if we're saying that all PDP members should have walked out, maybe not all of them felt like they were in the mood to walk out, some of them were a little sleepy, maybe not everyone felt like they needed to walk. So they may have also been in opposition to whatever was going on, but they don't think they had initially planned among themselves that if they don't allow us to speak, then we're all going to walk out. I think it was something that just happened spontaneously. And so not all of them were carried along with the walking out idea. So I wouldn't expect that all of them should have sat in or should have walked out, which for me is not completely abnormal. And once again, if there was a walking out because people felt like they needed a voice to speak with regards to the unfairness that they saw with regards to the Twitter ban, then it shouldn't have just been the PDP lawmakers. There's other lawmakers in that house. There's other political parties in that house that are supposedly also part of the opposition to the APC. And there should have also been APC lawmakers who don't necessarily should have walked out on plenary, but should have been able to raise their voice and say, this is what we think. But I want to imagine that we would... Let's imagine that we... The speakers from Guadabra, Mila, wants to take things slow and easy and wants to hear from the minister of information first before taking whatever steps that need to be taken. But of course, Nigerians are not going to be patient enough for all of that because every single day that passes, before we get to the 10 days that has been given for light Mohammed to appear in the house, every single day that passes, it makes business, it makes life. And those who depend on social media, those who have not been able to get jobs for themselves because of how the country is, depend on social media to sell their business. Depend on social media to secure themselves. I would always say, imagine an Inyo Bangu Morin case without Twitter. Do we have the facilities in Nigeria that would have been able to solve her case or would have been able to save her life? We do not. And let's not deceive ourselves that somehow, the Nigerian police who told them to wait for 48 hours before they declared, that's the police that they should have reached out to. It's not NTA either. It's not any of our television stations or any of our government media houses. So Twitter has been extremely and very, very useful in many, many ways. And so when one person feels his ego has been bruised and decides to shut it down. So let me also quickly, we're going to show you the video of where this happened. I was also quickly mentioned that when a government says that they suspended something, why then do you go ahead and say this thing is suspended or we can't use it in Nigeria for now, then then if you go and find another way to use it, you could be arrested. Why are you arresting me if you're suspended? If you're suspended, that's your problem. I would find my way to use it. When did Twitter become illegal? Like how do you make a social media app illegal? It's a question that even the brightest lawyers have had no answers for. You went ahead and telecommunication companies go cowed because, well, when Nigeria, they don't have a voice, they can't speak for themselves. So you went ahead and you told a lot of them to shut off Twitter. Fine. But people have found another way to use it. So why are you angry? Why are you making a social media app illegal? And the bigger question, why then would you break a law that you made? I mean... Well, if you look through to the space, you would still see Okonjewela and of course a couple of other people who have been found to still be using the app somewhere. The person who has been threatened to arrest people still went on through VPN to deactivate his Twitter account. So he broke the law first before he can now... And really just shows that it's just us charades. It's all just one person. Everybody lining up, crawling on the floor trying to please one person when they should be on the side of Nigeria. Let's show you a video of that walkout. We need to tell Nigerians our position. We need to tell our constituents our position. And we have also said that every member of the PVP purpose will continue to tweet. We are calling on the Attorney General. Leave Nigerians alone. Do not prosecute Nigerians. We are their representatives. We will tweet. Any day you want to prosecute us, tell us the parts and the time we will be there ourselves to surrender to your constituents. Okay, so they're saying they're ready to surrender themselves to be prosecuted. And that's the state of things right now. I think Donald Trump had actually congratulated Nigeria to say, well done. You suspended Twitter in your country. Why wasn't he able to do that before he left the president? Because he understands that his own country has laws. He understands that he cannot be a low-key dictator in his own country. So yes, he would take advantage of this, not just for the media conversations that he would bring. But he knows that in his own country, he wouldn't try this. He wouldn't even work. I know how much he struggled to ban immigration in certain states. And there were courts in certain states that told him, no, you can't do that. So he knows what would happen in his own country that has institutions that has, you know, senators and the National Assembly to some of all these things. But of course, he will speak, you know, in favor of the Nigerian government. And we should never forget that these are two different scenarios, two totally different situations entirely. The thing that happened in the United States, the attack on the capital, he inciting, you know, Americans and people who were his fans and followers, totally different from the narrative on how he played out here in Nigeria. The president tweeted, you know, a short thread. And one of those tweets in that thread seemed to be threatening violence against a certain region. It was reported by persons on Twitter. And then Twitter found it, yes, it must have broken some of their policy and deleted that particular tweet, not the whole thread. And this is why we're having this discussion today. I would always like to remind everyone that while we're having these discussions, 50 people died, 88 people died over the weekend, 20 died. This is close to 200 Nigerian lives that have been lost. The national discussion in the National Assembly and of course from Laid Mohamed and Malami and every other person, there's no word about these up to 200 Nigerian lives that have been lost. The best you get is a minute silence. That's from the National Assembly. They've had these minutes of silence that should make up at least three weeks if you put those one, one minute together since they got into that place. I think hearing and seeing these things play out like that. What exactly is important to the Nigeria of today? How come the Nigerian life is of so little value and doesn't create this much attention and this much fire within all the people who should be representing us. Instead, the biggest conversation we have today is the fact that Twitter deleted one tweet from the president and somebody felt, oh, how dare you delete our president's tweet. Let's shut it down. And then, of course, Nigerians saying, okay, well, you suspend it if you want to but we'll find another way to use it. Then you now declare that illegal and you threaten to arrest them. And then some of the people who have made these threats and made these statements go behind and use that same route to assess Twitter and all of that and of course cryptocurrency also. I'm really looking forward to the outcome of this decision all of this discussion really with the invitation the information minister, because they're saying that this Twitter ban should be lifted or the suspension, whatever it's called should be lifted until the investigations are concluded. So I need to see if that's exactly what's going to happen if we'll have another statement from the Ministry of Information and Communication to say this Twitter ban is lifted until investigations are conducted or if the attorney general or the federation will begin to arrest and prosecute people like he's threatened. So there's really a lot that is left to be seen and only time can tell. What do they have to investigate? We'll find out. There's nothing, there's absolutely nothing to investigate. There was no crime committed. The social media app has its policy if you break one of their policies just like a regular user and it wasn't I think who mentioned it yesterday. The conversation is not Twitter against Nigeria. It's one handle. The president's handle. Just like any other president's handle that is on their platform and so if any person breaks or breaches the policies of using that app yes you will, you know, of course be either suspended or that will be deleted. It's not rocket science. It's not Nigeria against Twitter. It wasn't Nigeria's Twitter handle. Even though lots of fans of the president believe that's what it is. I mean that actor you mentioned, I can't remember his name but he said it's not just a slap on the face of the president but on the faces of every other Nigerian. It really didn't make sense to me but that's what people think and like I've said it's up to the House of Reps now to do all the investigations with all the committees inviting Lai Muhammad and the rest. So yes, like I've said we'll find out in the coming days how this all plays out. So we'll take a break here to analyze the papers and the headlines and then we'll move on to the results.